Horace's Travelers Tale

An Overview

            Horace’s two books of Satires were written in the 30s BC and are discourses written in hexameter verse (see Guide below). Unlike the satires written by other authors, both before and after, Horace’s writing is rather jovial in tone, with no abuse aimed at powerful individuals, as well as being autobiographical.

            In ‘A Traveller’s Tale’ Horace is describing his travels in the entourage of Maecenas, a trusted counsellor of the (future) emperor Augustus and the most famous literary patron. Present as well were the poet Virgil and the tragedian Varius, who were also part of the literary circle funded by Maecenas.

            Horace tells how he joined the group at the town of Anxur and travelled south along the Appian Way as far as Brundisium. The aim of the journey was to attempt to make peace between Octavian (in ten years’ time he would become known as the emperor Augustus) and Mark Antony, although no mention is made of this in the poem.

The Hexameter

The line used by Homer and the Greek epic poets was adapted by the Romans. Horace’s ‘A Traveller’s Tale’ and Virgil’s ‘A Storm at Sea’ are both written in hexameter verse.
It has 6 (Greek hex) feet, usually a mixture of dactyls and spondees. A line with an unusual preponderance of dactyls might suggest speed, panic or any rapid movement; it will have 16 or 17 syllables. A line with nearly all spondees will give a very slow and solemn effect; it will have 13 or 14 syllables. Every line, however will always end with the pattern |  or . A horizontal line | shows where the foot ends; this is not necessarily the end of a word.

1           2             3           4             5          6

|  | | |  | |

|  | | |  | |

 Section 1

Lines 1-9 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, page 90

Day 1: Horace leaves Rome on the Appian Way with Heliodorus as his companion.           

egressum magna me accepit Aricia Roma

hospitio modico: rhetor comes Heliodorus,

Graecorum longe doctissimus; inde Forum Appi,

differtum nautis, cauponibus atque malignis.

                      hoc iter ignavi divisimus, altius ac nos                    5

praecinctis unum: minus est gravis Appia tardis.

hic ego propter aquam, quod erat deterrima, ventri

indico bellum, cenantes haud animo aequo

exspectans comites.

The Journey – where to and with whom?

         

            Horace travels south from Rome all the way along the Appian Way, as far as Brundisium. With him at the start is Heliodorus, the teacher of rhetoric; Maecenas, Cocceius and Fonteius Capito join them at Anxur; Virgil, Plotius and Varius meet up with the group at Sinuessa.

           

Name: Map of Appian Way 1904.jpg  

Keywords: Map of Appian Way 1904

 Notes   

1 – magna … Roma (‘mighty Rome’): Rome, with its population of about a million inhabitants, was a very impressive place.

            me accepit Aricia (‘Aricia welcomed me’): PERSONIFICATION possibly, as this town, which is about 16 miles from Rome, is made to sound more like a person.

2 – hospitio modico (‘with its 2* accommodation’): notice the instant contrast with magna Roma. Once out of Rome, standards decline.

            rhetor ... Heliodorus (‘Heliodorus, the teacher of rhetoric’): pupils who have studied the Oxford Latin Course should be familiar with this man, who appears in chapters 25-27.

3 - Forum Appi: this town, at least 20 miles beyond Aricia, was named after Appius Claudius Caecus, who began the building of the Appian Way in 312 BC. The town was at one end of a canal which went through the Pomptine marshes and ran as far as the temple of Feronia, near Anxur.

4 – nautis (‘with boatmen’): these were the men who plied their trade on the canal.

5-6 – altius … praecinctis (‘for those who are more energetic’): this phrase literally means ‘with their belts done up higher’ and applies to travellers on foot who tie up their tunics in order to walk faster.

7-8 – ventri indico bellum (‘I declare war on my stomach’): this probably means simply that Horace was unwilling to have dinner, as there was nothing to drink with it. The water was not good – a common curse when travelling in Italy – and so was not fit even to mix with wine, and the Romans very rarely drank undiluted wine. Alternatively, perhaps all he needed was some Imodium!

8 – haud animo aequo (‘impatiently’): literally meaning ‘not with a balanced mind’, this is an example of a literary device known as LITOTES.

Section 2

Lines 10-18 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, page 90

Days 2–3:  Night trip on a canal.

                                    iam nox inducere terris                                10

umbras et caelo diffundere signa parabat.

tum pueri nautis, pueris convicia nautae
ingerere: ‘huc adpelle!’; ‘trecentos inseris: ohe,
iam satis est!’ dum aes exigitur, dum mula ligatur,
                  tota abit hora. mali culices ranaeque palustres              15

avertunt somnos; absentem cantat amicam
multa prolutus vappa nauta atque viator

                       certatim:

Notes   

10-11 – iam nox … parabat (‘Now the night was preparing’): another touch of PERSONIFICATION, as well as being mock epic in style, bringing a little grandeur to the proceedings after the recent talk of diarrhoea.

13 – ingerere (‘heap .. upon’): first use of the HISTORIC INFINITIVE, used to make the description more graphic.

            huc adpelle! ; trecentos inseris (‘Bring the boat in here; you are cramming in three hundred people’): this could well be slaves bidding the boatmen to put in at the bank where their party is waiting and urging them not to fill the boat with too many passengers. trecentos should not be taken literally; it refers to an indefinitely large number, which I suppose makes it a HYPERBOLE, an exaggeration for effect.

15 – mali culices ranaeque palustres (‘nasty mosquitoes and frogs from the marshes’): a clear reference to the Pomptine marshes.

16 – A line full of SPONDEES, cleverly giving the impression of the slow passage of time.

17 – prolutus (‘drunk’): an interesting word literally meaning ‘soaked’, helping to create a very comical picture. The sailor who was in charge of the boat kept up a singing match with a passenger, as drunk as himself, until, in the next section, the latter went to sleep; then he would tether the mule which pulled the boat and fall asleep himself. So biting mosquitoes, croaking frogs and drunken singing all ensured that Horace had a poor night’s sleep.  

Section 4

Lines 25-34 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, page 92

Day 3:  Arrival at Anxur; more bad health; more friends.

                  ora manusque tua lavimus, Feronia, lympha.                 25

milia tum pransi tria repimus atque subimus
inpositum saxis late candentibus Anxur.
huc venturus erat Maecenas optimus atque
Cocceius, missi magnis de rebus uterque
                       legati, aversos soliti componere amicos.                    30

hic oculis ego nigra meis collyria lippus
illinere. interea Maecenas advenit atque
Cocceius Capitoque simul Fonteius, ad unguem
factus homo, Antoni non ut magis alter amicus.

Notes   

25 – Feronia: Feronia was an ancient Italian goddess who had a shrine with a grove and a fountain. The spring provided a refreshing respite, but the use of the archaic lavimus (‘we washed’) perhaps suggests some religious observance too.

26 – repimus (‘we crawled’): a good word to express the slow pace.

27 – Anxur: it was a steep climb to Anxur as it was on a hill, situated on a limestone cliff.

28 – Maecenas: Horace’s patron, who had probably just come from a meeting with Octavian, to whom he was a chief adviser as well as being a true friend. His full name was Gaius Cilnius Maecenas.

29 – Cocceius: this man had been consul in 39 BC and was responsible, along with Maecenas, for negotiating the treaty of Brundisium in 40 BC. As a result the Roman empire was divided up between the three members of the so-called Second Triumvirate: Octavian took Italy and the West, Mark Antony Greece and the East, whilst Lepidus had to make do with Africa. His full name was Lucius Cocceius Nerva and his brother Marcus was the great-grandfather of the emperor Nerva (AD 96-98).

29-30 – magnis de rebus ... legati (‘ambassadors on important business’): finally the prime purpose of the journey begins to come to light.

30 – aversos ... componere amicos (‘to reconcile estranged friends’): since the treaty of Brundisium, although never really ‘friends’, Octavian and Mark Antony had not seen eye to eye and civil war was again a possibility.

31-32 – oculis ..... illinere (‘ I smeared a black ointment on my sore eyes’): in the midst of all this talk of highly charged political manoeuvrings, Horace raises the matter of his poorly eyes. Let’s hope he had at least recovered from his upset stomach!

            Notice how illinere is another example of a HISTORIC INFINITIVE.

33 – Capito ... Fonteius: this man, whose full name was Gaius Fonteius Capito, served as consul in 33 BC and was one of Mark Antony’s legates in Asia Minor.

33-34 – ad unguem factus (‘without a flaw’): this interesting METAPHOR, literally meaning ‘made to the nail’, is from the world of workers in marble or wood, who used to test the smoothness of their finished work by passing their nail over it.

34 – Antoni: Marcus Antonius, or Mark Antony, had been co-consul with Julius Caesar at the time of the latter’s assassination back in 44 BC. Antony and Octavian had fought together to defeat Caesar’s killers, Brutus and Cassius. But even though Caesar had adopted Octavian as his heir, Antony tended to look upon Octavian as a young upstart. At the time of the treaty of Brundisium in 40 BC, Antony was 43 years old, whereas Octavian was only 23. In that same year Antony married Octavian’s sister, Octavia, but quite quickly dropped her for Cleopatra, queen of Egypt.

            In spite of the best efforts of the men mentioned in this poem to pacify the situation, things gradually worsened and civil war did erupt, resulting in the naval battle of Actium off the coast of Greece in 31 BC, where Octavian’s fleet, commanded by Agrippa, defeated the combined navies of Antony and Cleopatra.

            Octavian returned to Italy in 29 BC and was hailed as the saviour of Rome and the restorer of peace. He now inaugurated the system of government known as the ‘principate’ and he was in effect the first emperor; in 27 BC he was given the title of Augustus.

Section 5

Lines 35-46 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, page 92

Days 5-7:  Poets meet at Sinuessa; hospitality simple and grand.

                        postera lux oritur multo gratissima; namque                   35
Plotius et Varius Sinuessae Vergiliusque

                             occurrunt …

o qui complexus et gaudia quanta fuerunt!
nil ego contulerim iucundo sanus amico.
                  proxima Campano ponti quae villula, tectum                40
praebuit et parochi quae debent ligna salemque.

hinc muli Capuae clitellas tempore ponunt.

lusum it Maecenas, dormitum ego Vergiliusque;
namque pila lippis inimicum et ludere crudis.

                       hinc nos Coccei recipit plenissima villa,                   45
quae super est Caudi cauponas …

 Notes   

36 – Plotius et Varius ... Vergiliusque: Plotius (full name Marcus Plotius Tucca) and Varius (full name Lucius Varius Rufus) and Virgil (full name Publius Vergilius Maro, but more usually known by his anglicised name) were all friends and were part of Maecenas’ literary circle, along with Horace.

            Virgil is most famous as the author of ‘The Aeneid’; he was to die in 19 BC with his magnificent epic poem not quite complete. He had left instructions for it to be burnt, but, on the orders of Augustus, Plotius and Varius edited and published it and today we are all the richer for their actions.

38-39 – o qui complexus ... sanus amico (‘O what embraces there were, and how much joy! I would not have compared anything to such good company whilst in my right mind’): two complete lines of unadulterated happiness, brought about by being in the company of true friends.

40 – villula (‘a lodge for travellers on public duty’): literally meaning ‘a little villa’, this was possibly a villa publica – later called a mansio – set aside for people travelling on state business.

            Campano ponti (‘the Campanian bridge’): this was a bridge over the river Savo, which marked the boundary between the regions of Latium and Campania.

41 – parochi (‘local officers’): these were officials whose duty it was to supply those travelling on public service with shelter, wood, hay and salt.

43 – lusum it Maecenas (‘Maecenas goes to play ball’): a nice touch showing this important minister relaxing, rather like checking in to a hotel nowadays and going for a swim in the hotel’s pool. Poor Horace, with his eyes still sore, and Virgil, suffering probably from dyspepsia, a weak digestion, were in no fit state to join in.

45 – Coccei ... plenissima villa (‘Cocceius’ ample villa’): the previous lodge, with its diminutive ending (villula), stands in stark contrast to the well-stocked and spacious villa, described by the superlative plenissima.

46 – Caudi (‘of Caudium’): Caudium was 21 miles from Capua and was the site of a famous defeat suffered by the Roman army nearly 300 years earlier. Cocceius’ villa appears to have been built on higher ground, looking down on Caudium.

 Section 6

Lines 47-57 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, page 94

Days 8-9:  Dinner is burnt and the poet sees his homeland.

tendimus hinc recta Beneventum; ubi sedulus hospes
paene macros arsit dum turdos versat in igni:
nam vaga per veterem dilapso flamma culinam
                   Volcano summum properabat lambere tectum.                50

convivas avidos cenam servosque timentes
tum rapere, atque omnis restinguere velle videres.

incipit ex illo montis Apulia notos
ostentare mihi, quos torret Atabulus et quos
                    numquam erepsemus, nisi nos vicina Trivici                 55
villa recepisset lacrimoso non sine fumo,
udos cum foliis ramos urente camino.

Notes   

47 – Beneventum: Beneventum is 12 miles beyond Caudium.

48 – macros turdos (‘skinny thrushes’): yes, they used to eat thrushes!

49-50 – dilapso Volcano (‘when Fire escaped’): this means that the fire fell to pieces and the burning logs fell out onto the kitchen floor. Instead of the word for ‘fire’ Horace uses the name of the blacksmith god Vulcan, the god of fire. Roman poets often used the name of a god or goddess for the thing with which they were most closely associated. So Mars = war, Venus = love, Bacchus = wine, Vulcan = fire and Ceres = bread. This is a literary device known as METONYMY.

            Notice the ALLITERATION of vaga ... veterem ... Volcano, which may have been intentional and is certainly a reminiscence of epic poetry, which this scene conveys.

51 – servosque timentes (‘and the frightened slaves’): presumably the slaves were fearful of the fire, but perhaps also of being punished for the loss of the guests’ suppers.

53 – montis Apulia notos (‘Apulia .... mountains which are familiar to me’): Horace was born in Venusia in the region of Apulia, which extends into the heel of Italy, described as a ‘wild area’ in the Oxford Latin Course. This explains why he describes the mountains as notos.

54 – Atabulus: this was the name of a hot, parching wind, blowing from the Sahara, also known as the Sirocco.

55 – numquam erepsemus (‘we would never have climbed’): the verb appears in its syncopated (shortened) form, instead of erepsissemus, in order to fit the metre. This is a pluperfect subjunctive and the verb eripio is especially used for crawling upwards.

56 – lacrimoso non sine fumo (‘with smoke which brought tears to our eyes’): literally meaning ‘not without smoke full of tears’, this is an interesting turn of phrase in which the adjective lacrimoso refers not to the smoke , but to the eyes of the poor people affected. It is therefore known as a ‘transferred epithet’ or HYPALLAGE. Thus this section goes from a potentially dangerous house fire to a smoky bonfire.

Section 8

Lines 65-72 in OCR Latin Anthology for GCSE, pages 94-96

Days 12-15:  Bad weather and roads; a fishing port; a miracle; the end of the journey.

                    inde Rubos fessi pervenimus, utpote longum               65
carpentes iter et factum corruptius imbri.

postera tempestas melior, via peior ad usque
Bari moenia piscosi; dein Gnatia Lymphis
iratis exstructa dedit risusque iocosque,
                  dum flamma sine tura liquescere limine sacro                70

persuadere cupit.

… Brundisium longae finis chartaeque viaeque est.

Notes   

65 – Rubos:  the town of Rubi is 30 miles beyond Canusium; this is described as a tiring (fessi) journey, but we have to wait until the end of the second line to find out what made it so – rain (imbri).

66 – carpentes (‘making’): the translation does not do justice to this versatile word, here as a present participle, which you will know from Horace’s well-known phrase – ‘carpe diem’, ‘seize the day’.

68 – Bari ... piscosi (‘of Barium, well known for its fish’): not surprisingly, Barium sits close to the sea, a further 22 miles from Rubi. The journey here was in better weather (tempestas melior), but the road was not so good (peior, the opposite of melior). Teachers – note the error at this point in the OCR Latin Anthology Teacher’s Handbook!

            Gnatia: the towns are coming thick and fast now. The name is probably a local form of Egnatia (rather like referring to Liverpool as ‘Pool) and is 37 miles from Barium.

69 – exstructa (‘built’): in true guide-book style we are given some interesting information about the town of Gnatia:

            a) It was not well off for water. To tell us this, Horace uses the splendid phrase Lymphis iratis (‘where the water goddesses were angry’).

            b) It was a place where you could enjoy yourself: dedit risusque iocosque (‘provided us with fun and laughter’).

            c) The locals lay claim to the rather amusing notion that incense had at some time melted or turned to liquid on the steps of the temple. This seems to be of very little significance, unless Horace means that the incense has spontaneously burst into flames, as some have suggested.  It is not difficult to see that Horace regards this as something of an old wives’ tale.

            It is possible at this point to gain an insight into Horace’s religious beliefs. He was an Epicurean, who were said not to be afraid of the gods, because the gods did not interfere with people's lives. When things happened, it was just because of natural, scientific causes, and nothing to do with the gods. The gods lived lives of pure inactivity, pleased with their own virtue and wisdom, and with a couldn’t-care-less attitude to the sorrows and hardships of man.

72 – Brundisium: the end of the road, literally, as the Appian Way goes no further. Brundisium was 44 miles from Gnatia and was, and still is today, the port from which you would set off to sail to Greece.

            longae finis chartaeque viaeque (‘the end of both a long road and a long poem’): a very neat way to sign off. Horace is very modest about his poem, referring to it as charta, literally ‘a sheet of papyrus’.